Because creative thinking involves the mind and preventing childhood obesity involves more physical aspects of a child you may be having a hard time figuring out how one supports the other. But who says preventing childhood obesity only has to involve the physical aspects, particularly diet and exercise, of a child. Just to recap from a previous post, I am interested in the optimal functioning of a child on several levels, physical, emotional, social and cognitive. I feel developing a child on all of these levels simultaneously will give us greater results in developing the child than just focusing on just one.

This is the reason that I love dance and use it as a way of teaching children in all of these aspects of themselves. Children not only have a mind and intellect that need to be nourished and developed but also they need to learn and develop emotionally, physically and socially. Dance has a synergistic effect that includes all types of learners and the many different gifts and preferences of these learners.

A great example of how I use creative thinking in my dance class is after a particularly rigorous amount of movement, I take a working rest. This means just because our bodies are not working does not mean we cannot work other part of ourselves. I place a chair in the middle of our circle and ask the class how can we go under the chair. And instead of just calling out the answers I ask them to show me. I do this with children between the ages of 3 and 5. You would be amazed at what they come up with.

At the time I had about 7 or 8 students and each student believe it or not gave me a different way to go under the chair. One went under backwards , another went in from a different direction. Yet another instead of taking a straight path made a right angle as he went in from the front and instead of going straight through went out from the side. All of these children followed instructions correctly, even though all had different approaches.

So how does creative thinking support preventing childhood obesity you might still be wondering. First the obvious, all of the children were using their bodies. They had to use large muscles to complete the task and because most where crawling on the floor they had to use upper body strength to totally clear the chair.

Let’s look at what was happening other levels. One thing that I didn’t mention was that each time a child completed the task all the other students cheered and clapped. This was not initiated by me, the other students took it upon themselves. This created validation, acknowledgement and acceptance, all things that people not only kids want. This created a comradery among the students.

The children also learned that what they did mattered. That there can be more than one answer to a problem. They were allowed to be themselves and come up with their own way to accomplish the task. This built confidence within themselves and self esteem. They were inner directed in coming up with the answer not looking to me or the other students to give them the answer. They proved to themselves that they could do it.

How this supports preventing childhood obesity is when children and people feel good about themselves they will more likely take care of themselves better. They have learned that they can. They have learned that they matter. Because they have greater confidence in themselves they are taking on skills that are needed for success now and later in life. Have self esteem and confidence will have children be comfortable with doing things physical and otherwise.

I hope I have opened up your thinking a bit and you can see how this would be something that you could do with your children. Please feel free to share your thougths and comments and what your experiences are. We would love to hear from you. For more information on healthy things that you can do with your child get a free report at http://www.healthykidsweightloss.com .

YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!! So happy to hear from you Allison!!!!! Thank you so much for stopping by and adding your comments. It is so greatly appreciated. I also appreciate your compliment about the kids being so lucky to have me in their lives. I am so grateful and happy to do it and it brings me so much joy.

I was just thinking the other day about how I want to give them my best and develop them in the best way possible because I only get to see them once a week so I’ve got to make it count. Thank you for your acknowledgement. Stop by anytime Allison!!!